sincèrevssincéritéConfusable pair

Quick tell: sincère is a adjective, sincérité is a noun, so they fill different roles in a sentence.

Which to use

“sincère” is an adjective and “sincérité” is a noun - they look or sound alike but fill different roles in a sentence.

#5,401
“sincère” frequency rank
#9,237
“sincérité” frequency rank
14638
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature sincère sincérité
Definition Qui est franc, véridique, qui dit ce qu’il pense, ce qu’il sent réellement. Caractère de celui ou ce qui est sincère.

Where the eye mixes sincère and sincérité

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 5 letters in sequence. sincère runs 7 letters (CVCCVCV) against sincérité's 9 (CVCCVCVCV) - the length gap alone is often enough to separate them once you know to check it.

7 ch
sincère
9 ch
sincérité

Look-alike desk: sincère vs sincérité

These two trip readers on the page rather than in the ear: sincère is \sɛ̃.sɛʁ\ while sincérité is \sɛ̃.se.ʁi.te\. Spoken aloud the problem disappears. In writing it persists, because they differ by 2 letter(s) in length, and the parts of speech differ too (adjective vs noun), which is usually the fastest check. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 14638, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

sincère is recorded at frequency rank #5,401, classified as anadj, pronounced \sɛ̃.sɛʁ\. sincérité is at rank #9,237, tagged as anoun, pronounced \sɛ̃.se.ʁi.te\.

Glosses for this pair are partially populated in our dataset, but the full side-by-side definitions above should still guide you to the right choice.

With a confusion score of 14638, this pair ranks #395,812 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of sincère vs sincérité

Shared letters: cinrs. Private to "sincère": eè. Private to "sincérité": té.

"sincère" · 7 letters · shape CVCCVCV  ·  "sincérité" · 9 letters · shape CVCCVCVCV

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "sincère" for "sincérité" ever safe?
No - they are not even the same part of speech. "sincère" is an adjective and "sincérité" a noun, so a sentence built for one is usually ungrammatical with the other.
Frequency check: "sincère" vs "sincérité" - which ranks higher?
"sincère" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #5,401 in our French list, against #9,237 for "sincérité". The two are close in frequency, so neither is a safe default; check the meaning rather than guessing.

Useful next steps

Eye-level mix-up between "sincère" and "sincérité" is sorted above. Next: full entries or other pairs that share a letter shape.

  • Full dictionary entry for "sincère" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "sincérité" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #395,812 of 440,172 scored French confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "sincère" and "sincérité" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "Sancerre vs sincère". Nearby pair

Confusion rank #395,812 of 440,172 scored French pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.

Source: Wiktionary (via kaikki.org) Structured Wiktionary extract

Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list